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So the wife's desktop hard-drive died just before Christmas. Took it to my local IT repair place, but they couldn't resurrect it. No matter, both our machines are backed up to well-known angel (I assume angels are beings that live in clouds )

So I agreed to take back her netbook that she never uses, and give her my laptop. I managed to get my data off the laptop and onto the netbook, so that was sorted. But we both decided that the laptop wasn't useable for her with Vista on it, so I installed Win7 from an OEM disk.

Next problem, getting the data back off the cloud. Downloaded the backup/restore app, and tried to transfer the subscription to the new computer. Must have done something wrong, and ended up with a new subscription on the laptop. Hmmm. Deleted the subscription and phoned the angel, who must have been busy because it took 38 minutes to get through. Then life got really interesting. According to the angel, the wife had stopped backing up in 2010 and I had never backed up at all.

After being quite rude to the angel, I opened up the backup console on my computer and found it was in the middle of a backup. So where was it going to if I didn't have a subscription? At his request, I read off the email address that was configured on the console - the same address I had given him seven times already! He still couldn't find my subscription until we had tried the radio alphabet ("ITEM ALPHA NOVEMBER, DOT, DELTA, ECHO, NOVEMBER ... ) and then all of a sudden the angel found my subscription. YAY! And my wife's (which I must have linked to my account in 2010). So I followed instructions to transfer her subscription to the correct hardware, restored her data, and installed MS.Office (Home Use Program - only cost me $10), and her Expenses application, and linked both to the restored data.

All I've got left to do is set up a new backup schedule and we'll be good to go. Oh - and I found that my netbook battery won't hold a charge, so I've got a new one on order - and a docking station for the laptop for when she wants to use it in her home office.

So, when I said I had a non-techie Christmas, I meant that we were without techie over Christmas but, as usual, I was her IT hero!

In my view, the terms "backup" and "cloud" in the same sentence are a non sequitur. Given how cheap external hard drives are (I've seen 2TB drives for $100), I'd go with a local backup that you know you can access. Buy two drives and alternate them, keeping one in a separate location from your home. Swap them periodically.

And I agree with him about the steep learning curve for Blender. We used it in my Production Graphics class to put 3D modeled objects into a video. The simple version we did first wasn't too hard as long as you followed the instructions from the tutorial, but my group did a more involved version for our final project using realistic models/textures. The lighting is the hardest part.

The United States invariably does the right thing, after having exhausted every other alternative. -Winston Churchill

America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. -Oscar Wilde

Wow, even the French showed a little more spine than that before they got their sh*t pushed in.[^] -Colin Mullikin

I don't belong to the texting community, so please forgive my temporary ignorance...

When you hear "Text YOUWIN to 95120", where exactly does that text go? I see it a lot on news shows and hear it on the radio. I can't tell if they are receiving the texts on a computer or mobile phone. Somehow they are tallying the results.